Highlights

• Gansu Rare Earths developed a cobalt-free, low-nickel NFC alloy powder that passed pilot validation and secured a 2-ton purchase order within a year of R&D launch.
• The breakthrough alloy offers lower costs, improved activation performance, and enhanced high-temperature charge-retention for hydrogen storage applications.
• This development signals China's push to dominate new-energy materials supply chains, potentially challenging Japanese and Korean incumbents in hydrogen-storage markets.

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China’s Gansu Rare Earths has quietly reported (opens in a new tab) what may become an important development in the next generation of hydrogen-storage materials: a cobalt-free, low-nickel NFC alloy powder that just passed customer pilot validation and secured an initial two-ton purchase order.

While small in volume, the significance lies in what the company claims it has achieved—and how quickly. The project was launched only in January. Within a year, the R&D team reports breakthroughs in both cost reduction and performance stability, two of the biggest barriers to commercializing advanced hydrogen-storage alloys.

The innovation centers on a “co-doping, multiphase structural tuning” technique—language that signals China’s continued push to move upstream in specialty materials, especially those tied to new-energy technologies.

According to the company, the new NFC formulation offers:

• Lower raw-material costs by sharply reducing nickel content—important at a time when nickel prices are volatile and supply increasingly geopolitically sensitive.
• Improved activation performance, meaning the hydrogen-storage alloy can begin working faster and more efficiently, a critical parameter in fuel-cell and battery-hybrid systems.
• Comparable performance to mainstream cobalt-free powders on stability and reliability.
• A breakthrough in high-temperature charge-retention, a key metric for next-generation hydrogen storage, mobility applications, and grid-scale energy systems.

If validated independently, the combination of lower cobalt, lower nickel, and improved thermal performance may represent a material-level competitive advantage for Chinese suppliers—one that could challenge Japanese and Korean incumbents in hydrogen-storage alloy markets.

The company is also rapidly aligning production, sales, and technical support—the classic Chinese “industrial sprint” model—to accelerate commercialization and gain early market share.

For the West, two questions arise:

1. Is this a true materials breakthrough or a state-media overstatement?
2. If real, does it give China another edge in hydrogen-energy supply chains at a time when the U.S. and EU are trying to localize materials production?

Either way, Gansu Rare Earths’ announcement signals China’s intention to push deeper into high-value new-energy materials—not just rare-earth magnets, but hydrogen-storage alloys that could shape next-decade technologies.

Disclaimer: This news item originates from a Chinese state-owned media source. Key details should be independently verified.

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